How can PHP be used to handle special characters like umlauts in contact forms?

Special characters like umlauts can be handled in PHP by using the `utf8_encode()` function to encode the input data before processing it. This function converts any string to UTF-8 encoding, which can properly handle special characters like umlauts. By using this function on form input data before storing or processing it, you can ensure that special characters are correctly handled in your PHP application.

// Handle special characters like umlauts in form input
$input_data = $_POST['input_data']; // assuming input data is coming from a form field

$encoded_data = utf8_encode($input_data);

// Now $encoded_data can be safely used in your PHP application